Judgy McJudgerson

These past two weeks for me have been such an emotional rollercoaster. My mother was in the hospital last week! Goodness gracious really? Not again! At least my parents have an agreement to alternate their hospital episodes. In spite of that I’ve had a pretty good 2 weeks. Being in the hospital this time was a complete different story then when my dad was there, I don’t know how many of you remember Doug the man with the amputated leg, but that was my dad’s neighbor in his hospital room. He was quiet, serene, and alone. This time God thought it would be fun to shower us with bright neighbors. J

As I laid across the bottom half of my mom’s hospital bed trying to be a comfortable pregnant lady, I heard the LOUD snores of my mom’s neighbor. I thought, oh great, we are going to have to listen to that for a long while! This lady slept through everything! Nurses poking her , our conversations, the really loud crazy woman down the hall screaming her head off “I know you’re there……. I know you’re there…… dinner is all paid for ……. what are you waiting for!? I can SEE you!” she screamed. All this going on around her and still the neighbor, fast asleep and snores galore. That is until her family arrived. Two African American women, her daughter Ashley, 26 and niece, Kikki , in her thirties filled the room with boisterous voices. They said hello to us with bright smiles. Kikki had 4 missing teeth, and Ashley was well overweight and wearing an America’s Next Top Model T-shirt. Oh boy my mind, as much as I hate to admit it instantly filed them into healthy stereotypes. They started unpacking a bag and took out body shower and requested towels from the nurse. Start of my nasty thoughts: Really you’re going to take a shower here!? REALLY. Why don’t they just go home and shower? Cheese and rice, this is a hospital where there are sick people and you waltz in asking for towels to go shower in a shower where sick people shower. Ewwwww. End of my nasty thoughts. To kill time, I prepared to paint my toe nails when both Ashley and Kikki were back from their showers, they both looked refreshed and clean wearing the same bottom halves as they were before, they had fresh shirts on and white towels hid their wet hair. As I was trying to take my nail polish off, Kikki looked over at me and yelled, “Wait , wait, wait” and excitedly looked in her bag ,producing nail polish remover pads she shoved them at me saying , “Use these, they are better.” She smiled her four missing teeth smile at me and my heart hurt with love for her. Here I was being such a Judgy Mcjudgerson and here she was being KIND and loving towards me! After a little while I got to talking to both of them and learned that Ashley’s mother had been in the hospital for EIGHT months!!! Going in and out a couple of days at a time but always ending back in the hospital due to her severe Sickle Cell Anemia. I learned that they HAVE to see the hospital as their home because they have been there for EIGHT months being a support system for their mother/aunt! Holly Molly I felt like such a little piece of Sherman oaks when I realized how badly I had judged them without even knowing ANYTHING about them, but what they looked like. They ended up being the funnies people that just brightened my day with their stories and laughs! I’m so grateful that I was able to experience this. I’ve always tried my hardest to NOT judge people and to see the positive in everyone, but oh how fast and easy it is to let that slip. How many times do you go around judging people without being able to hear their side of the story? Had I not talked to them I would have never of been put in my place! I urge you today to pay attention to your thoughts and live conscientiously of how you view people around you. Take the lead and learn someone before you have a nasty thought. Learn them before you license yourself to put them in a stereotype. Choose love over judgment, and you’ll live happier!

Have a beautiful weekend!!